US chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) said yesterday that microchip prices will remain under pressure as it battles to return to profitability after posting four consecutive quarterly losses.
"The good news is for consumers -- prices keep going down," AMD chief executive officer Hector Ruiz told reporters in the southern Indian city of Bangalore after opening the company's third silicon design and research facility in India.
"The bad news is we always have to figure out how to still keep doing that and make money," he said.
"It is a very competitive industry and I don't see prices being anything but competitive in any segment of this industry," Ruiz added, after opening AMD's third Indian silicon design and research facility in Bangalore.
He said that returning to profitability is the "No. 1 goal" of AMD, the world's second-largest chipmaker, which has been fighting for market share against bigger rival Intel and posted four straight quarters of losses.
The company, which had debt of some US$5.3 billion at the end of September, this month sold an 8.1 percent stake to the Abu Dhabi government in a transaction that raised US$608 million after paying for expenses.
Ruiz, who became CEO of Sunnyvale, California-based AMD in April 2002, said he didn't foresee the technology industry being hurt by a slowdown in the US economy.
"We are fortunate in being in an industry that has pervasive applications," Ruiz said, a day after the Fed warned that signs of a slowdown are becoming apparent. "We don't see a slowdown in the adoption of technologies."
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